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Using Our Land (continued)
Modifications:
• Suggest ways in which the lesson might be modified for specific student audiences, different abilities, etc.
• A scribe can be used for those that need help with getting their thoughts into written word form. Students may create groups
to complete the first part of this lesson. A group could work on the food mile activity together.
Extensions:
• How might this lesson be extended to enhance the learning?
Limitation of this activity: This activity only measures the miles from distribution to your house. It does not account for
the miles from where the food is grown/raised to where it is packaged for distribution. We could continue the first part of this
lesson by taking into account the packing locations.
• Is buying local always the most sustainable?
What might some exceptions be? Ex: Some crops have a very high-water footprint. If you live in a water scarce area, it would
be more sustainable to import these crops. Ex: Growing crops out of season can come with a cost–carbon emissions from
heated greenhouses. It would be more sustainable to ship from another location than to fuel heated greenhouses all winter.
Vocabulary:
Food mile
Carbon
Emission
Carbon footprint
Seasonal
Local
Assessment:
• How will students be assessed for this lesson?
Weigh the food waste bucket for the first week. Get an average calculation and over the months of composting food waste
and continuing the discussion on food waste and how it affects our environment the food waste bucket weight should go
down as students waste less and less food. In order for this lesson to be successful the food waste bucket should decrease in
weight over a 3-month period time.
Resources:
• What outside materials would support this lesson? Please include links.
• Use a PowerPoint presentation to support the visual learners. The following videos links will be used as well:
https://foodprint.org/issues/the-problem-of-food-waste/
https://foodprint.org/eating-sustainably/seasonal-food-guide/
https://www.epa.gov/recycle/reducing-wasted-food-home
https://moveforhunger.org/the-environmental-impact-of-food-waste
https://www.nationalgeographic.org/media/food-waste/
https://www.nationalgeographic.org/video/til-we-waste-one-third-food-worldwide/
